Thursday, September 28, 2006

International Malls: Broadmarsh Shopping Centre

Nottingham, England - circa 1972

Swank was certainly still in style in the '70s--if you knew where to look. Appears to be alive and well here at the Broadmarsh Shopping Centre, in Nottingham, England! Quite a unique look they had going, as witnessed by this vintage interior shot.

I love the juxtaposition of the cool floor design and avocado facing on the second floor, along with the modernistic ceiling and beautifully tiled pillars! All pretty darn snazzy if you ask me. This mall (which opened in 1972) is Westfield owned these days (of course).

10 Comments:

Oh, yellow... Never a good choice for a shopping center.In England, they call malls "out-of-town centres" because they, of course, are typically just outside of town. Looks like Westfield is going to double the size of this one. And hey, did anyone know TJ Maxx in England is TK Maxx?Scott

I have an old 70s avacado coffee percolator that's exactly the same color as that facing! Actually, it's called "avacado mist" on the bottom label, but I just had to go dig that sucker out and hold it next to the screen--yep, they match perfectly!! Not sure if that's good or bad, lol.

In England, they call malls "out-of-town centres" because they, of course, are typically just outside of town.

Seemed to be a similar matter in the US, where malls often were built outside of town in land that was once farmland, abandon airfields, etc. These days, those malls that are still around often aren't "out-of-town" given how the town eventually grew around them in later years. Being reminded of seeing pics of what Westfield Franklin Park had looked like in the 50's or 60's when it was an airport or such.

What mall isn't owned by Westfield these days?

Too bad they forgot to buy out Southwyck while they had the chance in Toledo. Now it's going to be torn up in favor of another outdoor commercial/residential property that's not going to be of any interest to me during the wintertime.

For some reason, this place reminds me of my highschool, built in 1976. They used the same freaky yellow.

I am British and have never heard the term "Out-of-town-center". And, unlike the US, our malls are more commnly located in the very center of a city (downtown) rather than in the suburbs as you would see in the US.

The exceptions are the more modern mega-malls that have sprung up since the late 80s, such as Meadowhall, Lakeside, Bluewater, The Trafford Center and so on.

Broadmarsh is actually located right in the very center of Nottingham, and also houses the city's main bus station. Nottingham also has the Victoria Center, abouta mile to the north, still in the city center. Broadmarsh has always been "The other mall" with lower-end retailers. The mall got worse and worse and was almost a dead mall in the early 1990's. Then a major refurb bought it to life and as you have noted, there are plans to enlarge it further and make it more of a lifestyle center.

The TKMaxx store in the center used to be a Co-op Department store. That closed down in the early 90's and Alders, a rather upmarket store by Broadmarsh standards, took it's place. Alders went bust a couple of years after it opened in Nottingham and TKMaxx moved in.

The reason that TJMaxx is called TK in the UK is that there was already a discount retailer in the UK called T J Hughes, Maxx renamed soas not to cause confusion when they entered the UK fairly recently. Now every town has one, normally in a city-center location rather than the bog box locations as you often find them in the US.

Finally, Westfield actually own very few malls in the UK. Australia, the home of Westfield... EVERYTHING is owned by them, so it seems.